Charter School Firm Attacks Online Criticism

Lane writes "News-Press.com reports that 'Charter Schools USA is threatening legal action against parents who use an Internet discussion board to air grievances about Gateway Charter.'" This despite comments which the parents say are based on the public record, and posted anonymously.

Comments

So much for freedom of speech

[jnmontario]

Another great example of somebody with expensive lawyers telling (read: threatening) the average person what they can do or think. Yay America.

Re:So much for freedom of speech

[Entrope]

Where does due process come into the picture? (Answer: it doesn't, since due process is about a person being able to protect himself against one-sided legal action.) The Constitution provides no penalties for libel, and corporations generally have as little ground as public figures do when it comes to making defamation claims. The joke has a nugget of truth in that in America, everything that is not prohibited is permitted.

You also confuse the company's claim that the posts are defamatory with that actually being the case. Since the company refused to identify -- even as an example -- any post on the site that was defamatory, I doubt even they believe they have a case that would stand up in court. They just want to scare people into compliance.

Re:So much for freedom of speech

[Daniel Dvorkin]

Charter schools aren't just any corporation. They receive taxpayer money to do a job usually performed by government bodies (public schools) and are therefore acting as an arm of government. So yeah, I'd say this is a First Amendment issue.

Re:So much for freedom of speech

[m_evanchik]

IANAL, but this is not such an open and shut case. These ignoramuses at CSUSA don't know what real criticism is, so I am going to show them.

These are CHARTER schools, which means that they perform an essential public service, education, with a special dispensation from the government. Their role is not strictly private. They are taking over a service that would normally be publically administered, and therefore open to the same type of broad criticism that public figures and institutions may be subject to. As such their openness to criticism is much greater than your average private business.

The public has an essential and compelling interest in promoting good education. This forum promotes that interest by fostering said discussion, a compelling and essential service. The interest of the corporation in protecting its image is far outweighed by the overwhelming interest of the public to have an open forum to discuss the public service the school provides. This charter school, it should also be noted is publically funded. Their CEO is a political pal of Jeb Bush. The President of the United States uses this organisation as a stage for his attacks on the public school system. CSUSA stinks of sacrificing childrens' futures in the name of political expediency. Like a diseased, filth-ridden sexual deviant, CSUSA sacrifices children in its perverse worship of Mammon. The Chairman and CEO, Jonathan K. Hage, is worse than John Wayne Gacy. (That last remark may be over the top, not in its accuracy, but merely in rhetorical appropriateness.)

The bottom line is that they are using strong-arm tactics to quell legitimate criticism and dissent. It stinks to high heaven and underscores an essential misunderstanding by their management to their public mission. They should have their charter pulled for this kind of legal thuggery.

It is my considered opinion that CSUSA is a rotten organisation with no business educating children. Their operation and their thuggish legal tactics are an affront to all civic-minded people.

This is pretty strong criticism and I stand by it. I find it hard that there was anything worse on the board in question. I can't stand bullies.

Bad move

[A beautiful mind]

Honestly, i couldn't have found a worse course of action to take by that organization, to dig their own grave. First they only had to deal with 65 parents, now its in the press. Talk about bad PR.

Call me crazy

[cat_jesus]

But don't you have to identify what specifically you consider libelous and defamatory if you are going to take legal action? I Guess Darl McBride has some alumni running Charter Schools USA.

I would write a letter back saying I have complied and to please let me know if I missed anything.

Fox News Generation!

[Adult film producer]

is there such thing as libel and slander anymore ? Seriously, fox news has perfected this type of character assassination by qualifying all their statements with "Rumour has it John Doe has been killing fetuses".. or "It's been said that jack frost hates the military and is a liberal!" or "Word around Capital Hill indicates democrats want to kill god" ... Easy as pie..

Nothing is slander anymore, it's just "Your opinion" Watch fox news sometime, they get away with saying crazy stuff all the time by using that legal technique.

That's the great thing about privatization

[smchris]

Accountability!

Oh? Never mind.

Re:difficult to deal with

[notque]

This will be their downfall. In the end, people will remember Charter Schools USA as "difficult to deal with" and not as a good place to send their child to.

Sad.

It's only sad if they are not difficult to deal with, which from the message board it would seem they are.

I would think the administration would want to deal with their concerns head on. If they are wrong on the message board, that would easily be addressed at a PTO meeting.

Which CSU has canceled until the end of the School year.

Seems pretty difficult to deal with to me.

Re:true tort reform.

[Compulawyer]

"Real" cease and desist letters place a potential defendant on notice that a potential plaintiff considers the actions of the potential defendant to be illegal or more specifically, a violation of the rights of the potential plaintiff and/or causing the potential plaintill harm. This has the legal effect of supplying notice to a potential defendant.

With some causes of action, if a potential plaintiff continues the conduct after having been explicitly notified, and if that action is deemed illegal, the defendant can be held to have acted willfully. In most cases, willful conduct results in greatly increased damages. In just about all cases, willful conduct looks very bad to a jury.

Charter Schools USA, 20 second judgement

[AndroidCat]

No link to them, so I went and had a look. They're definitely in the education business, that's for sure. Their site starts cheerful enough with the reaching kid graphic and Putting Children First sm slogan. Strangely, their mission and who we are pages don't mention much about kids after that. The Starting a Charter School makes my eyes glaze over.

I have no idea of how good they are as schools, do they have a political leaning, or anything like that. If I was a parent, I'd probably ask some questions too. Definitely an Edu-Corp.

Re:So...

[donscarletti]

Are they going to sue slashdot?

No, but unless this post is modded to +5 I will.